Now that the Washington Capitals’ resurgent 2024-25 regular season has come to an end, we look forward to the first round of the playoffs: a match-up against the upstart Montreal Canadiens. In this post, we’ll examine both the Capitals and the Canadiens’ performance throughout the season, as well as head-to-head performances.
The statistics used in this post are courtesy of Natural Stat Trick, Hockey Reference, Evolving Hockey, and HockeyViz. If you’d like to learn more about the terms used in this post, please check out our NHL Analytics Glossary.
2024-25 Season Overall Performance
Before we get into the head-to-head matchup data between the Caps and the Habs, let’s first look at the season-long performance of each squad and see how they stack up to each other. We want to start at the highest sample size of data we possibly can, particularly over the 82-game slate rather than the meager (in comparison) three-game regular season series against the Habs.
First up, let’s take a look at how each squad fared in shot generation metrics over the course of the season:
There’s some stark differences here during five-on-five play. The Capitals typically controlled the pace of play by attempting the majority of Corsi (CF%) and Fenwick (FF%) shot attempts, which generally means a higher rate of puck possession.
The most important factor to consider in this snapshot of performance is how the Capitals’ Goals For percentage (GF%) stacked up to their Expected Goals For percentage (xGF%). I’ve pointed this out in the past, but most successful teams actual goal scoring outpaces their xGF rates, due to offensive finishing capabilities. We saw last season where the Capitals had the inverse relationship between xGF% and GF% — and the team struggled to score goals all season. This season’s iteration of the Capitals has not had the same scoring struggles.
On the other hand, Montreal doesn’t exactly have the most glowing underlying metric performance. They typically are out-possessed, out shot, and do not have the majority of five on five goal scoring on their side. On top of that, their xGF% outpaces their GF%, which points to struggles finishing chances (and they were meager to begin with). Outside of Montreal’s top players (excluding Ivan Demidov…for now) in Nick Suzuki, Cole Caufield, Lane Hutson, and Juraj Slafkovsky, no skater for the Habs scored more than 38 points. In terms of goal scoring, the Habs only had two 30 goal guys (with Caufield leading the way with 37), two 20 goal getters, and eight double-digit goal scorers. Compare that to the Capitals who had a forty goal scorer (Alex Ovechkin), two 30 goal scorers (Tom Wilson and Aliaksei Protas), four 20 goal scorers (Dylan Strome, Connor McMichael, Pierre-Luc Dubois, and Jakob Chychrun), and two 14 goal scorers in Andrew Mangiapane and Nic Dowd.
And now, we will see a large contributor to the scoring differential between these two squads:
All season, the Caps have controlled the majority of scoring chances generated (SCF%), scoring chance goals for percentage (SCGF%), high danger chances generated (HDCF%), and high danger goals for (HDGF%). Inversely, the Habs struggled in all four of these metrics, particularly HDGF%.
The Capitals finished the regular season with the second best five on five goal scoring rates per sixty minutes of play (GF/60) in the league. Montreal finished with the 17th ranked GF/60 mark in the league.
Now that we’ve seen five-on-five performance from the two squads, let’s take a look at each team’s holistic performance across all major situations this season using Evolving Hockey’s team Regularized Adjusted Plus-Minus (RAPM) charts:
For the Caps, we see a team that was rightfully towards the top end of the NHL standings in the regular season. There were no real obvious flaws in this team in terms of metrics outside of a couple of negative metrics in expected goals against per 60 (xGA/60) during even strength and Corsi shot attempts against per 60 (CA/60) during the penalty kill. Higher CA/60 on the penalty kill is not inherently bad unless we see causation: weaker performance in xGA/60 in that game situation. We do not see that causation here, especially since the Caps’ penalty kill was tied for fourth best in the league at 82%.
The story for the Habs’ performance continues along the same trend for their overall five-on-five performance during the season. We see a team here that struggles mightily defensively during even strength, and does not convert actual goal scoring that exceeds the rate of expected goals. They struggled on the power play, finishing 21st.
Head to Head Performance
Now that we see how each team performed throughout the regular season, let’s take a look at their head to head performances: 
In terms of shot attempts and overall shots on goal, the Capitals controlled the lion’s share in matchups against the Habs. There’s a considerable discrepancy between the two sides, and the Capitals really owned shot generation during five-on-five play in the three matchups against the Habs.
When looking at chance generation, we see a considerable out-performance by Washington in regards to HDCF%. The Capitals generated more high danger chances and suppressed Montreal’s ability to generate those same high danger opportunities.
And when we look at actual conversion on those scoring and high danger chances, the Capitals turned the bevy of chances into actual goals, owning a super majority of scoring chance goals for and high danger goals for during five on five play.
And when we look at just goals for percentage and expected goals for percentage, the Capitals continued the ownership of success here. During five on five play, the Capitals really took it to the Habs in head to head matchups this season.
The Takeaway
The Capitals are (and should be) the favorite to win this first round match-up against the Canadiens, but anything can happen in the playoffs. We can be reminded of the 2010 quarterfinals matchup against the Canadiens after the Caps had convincingly won the President’s Trophy in the preceding regular season, only to lose the series in seven games. Or, in favor of the Capitals, in 2012 when the Caps squeaked into the playoffs only to upset the defending Cup Champion Bruins in the first round.
Ultimately, this series is dependent on the Capitals finding the “on” switch after coasting for a few weeks after wrapping up the Metro Division title and Ovechkin solidifying himself as the greatest goal scorer in the history of the sport. The Canadiens will be hungry to prove they belong, and if they get hot goaltending, look out.
By Justin Trudel
